On October 21, Russia and the People's Republic of China turned to the
United Nations with a simple demand. They are asking the U.N. to force the
United States to cease attempts to defend itself.1

What President Clinton will do about this, if anything, is unclear.

The President has for years been of two minds about U.S. efforts to defend
U.S. civilians against nuclear attack. He has long said that he does not
oppose a missile defense program, but, not long after taking office in 1993,
he cancelled a program to develop and deploy such a defense.

More recently, in July 1999, the President signed the National Defense
Act, which requires deployment of a missile defense system "as soon
as technologically possible." Immediately after signing this bill into
law, however, the President released a statement saying that he had yet
to decide to approve - or not - deployment of a missile defense system.2

Russia and China have now upped the ante in the missile defense debate,
submitting a resolution to the United Nations calling for strict U.S. compliance
with the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which bans a nationwide
anti-missile defense system in both the United States and the Soviet Union.

In pushing for enforcement of the ABM treaty against America, however,
Russia and China are choosing to ignore one very critical fact: the ABM
treaty is no longer valid because one of the only two nations to sign it
no longer exists.

"Fifteen states emerged from the former Soviet Union in 1991,"
writes missile defense expert Baker Spring of The Heritage Foundation in
Washington. "None of the states, including Russia, is capable - alone,
or with any of the others - of assuming the Soviet Union's ABM treaty obligations."3

In other words, the ABM Treaty is null and void, so the U.S. is free
to protect civilians in their homes from incoming nuclear missiles.

Some arms control advocates have been reluctant to embrace this fact,
apparently because they are so tied to the notion that arms control treaties
are good that they can't stand to give one up, even if circumstances have
changed and getting rid of an archaic treaty could save millions of lives.

Reflecting this odd, potentially tragic but pervasive thinking among
the arms control establishment, President Clinton as late as May 1998 insisted
that the ABM Treaty is still in effect. But he may have changed his mind.
In a February 10, 1999 report to Congress, the Administration relayed its
view that no foreign nations are now a party to the ABM Treaty.4

In other words, the only remaining ABM Treaty signer is the United States,
so it is up to us to decide whether or not we should remain bound by its
terms.

The arguments for building a missile defense system are compelling:

* According to the 1999 Cox Report, China could begin deployment of
nuclear missiles with a 5,000-mile range by 2002, which would permit China
to stage or threaten a nuclear attack in the Pacific Northwest. By 2005,
China may have nuclear missiles with an 8,000-mile range, capable of reaching
almost the entire U.S.5 China's development of these missiles, which very
likely are being built with U.S. technology, goes a long way toward explaining
China's antipathy toward a U.S. defense against missile attacks.

* Civil conflict in Russia could result in an accidental launch of nuclear
missiles,6 or Russia's government could change for the worse.

* Nations hostile to the United States, including Iran and North Korea,
could build nuclear missiles capable of hitting the U.S. mainland within
five years. Furthermore, because weapons inspections in Iraq have precipitously
declined, Iraq could have this capability in five years as well.7

* Technology exports, both intentional and inadvertent, from Russia,
the U.S., Europe, China and elsewhere are giving more and more nations
the ability to build weapons of mass destruction. These weapons are very
attractive to many small nations because, compared to the cost of maintaining
armies, navies and air forces, building ballistic missiles is cheap.

The United Nations in recent years has taken for itself more and more
responsibility, but, even if the U.N. decides to go along with Russia and
China and tries to forbid the United States from defending itself, the United
States does not have to comply.

President Clinton is known to be looking for a legacy, something monumentally
positive to overcome the stain of impeachment upon his presidency. Should
this President reject the pleas of foreign nations - nations, not incidentally,
with missiles pointing in our direction - and move decisively to protect
hundreds of millions of Americans from nuclear attack, he will be making
a very substantial, positive contribution to his position in history.